Terms of use
Plain terms for a free, open-source civic tool. No fine print traps.
Last updated: July 7, 2026
What this is
FillTheHole.ca is a free, independent, community-run tool for reporting and tracking potholes in Waterloo Region, Ontario. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or operated by the City of Kitchener, City of Waterloo, City of Cambridge, the Region of Waterloo, the Province of Ontario, or any other government body. By using the site you agree to these terms.
Acceptable use
Use the site in good faith. Specifically, don't:
- Submit false, fake, or deliberately mislocated reports.
- Upload photos you don't have the right to share, or that contain people's faces, licence plates, or other identifying details you'd need consent for.
- Upload content that is illegal, hateful, harassing, sexual, or otherwise inappropriate. Photos are automatically screened and human-reviewed; violations are removed.
- Attempt to bypass the geofence, rate limits, or duplicate-prevention, or automate submissions.
- Scrape, overload, or attack the service. (The open data below means you don't need to scrape — just use the feeds.)
We may remove any report or photo, and block abusive traffic, at our discretion.
Your reports and photos
You keep ownership of anything you submit. By submitting a report or photo, you grant this project a non-exclusive, royalty-free licence to display, store, and distribute it as part of the public pothole record and the open datasets below. Because the map is a public accountability tool and the data is released openly, treat every submission as public and permanent — don't include anything private. Photos are held for moderation and are only published after an administrator reviews them.
Safety
Never put yourself in danger to report a pothole. Don't stop in traffic or step onto a road. Report from a sidewalk, a parking lot, or after you've safely parked. No pothole is worth an injury. For an urgent road hazard, contact your municipality directly.
No warranty, no liability
All pothole data is community-sourced and unverified. Reports may be inaccurate, outdated, or mislocated; a pothole marked "filled" may have been re-reported in error. Do not rely on this map as a definitive record of road conditions.
The site is provided "as is," without warranty of any kind, express or implied. To the fullest extent permitted by law, the operator is not liable for any damage to vehicles, injuries, or losses arising from use of, or reliance on, anything displayed here. For official road-hazard reporting, use the city and provincial links on the About page.
Open data & open source
The pothole dataset is published openly (CSV and RSS) for research, journalism, and civic use — no API key required. The site's source code is released under the GNU AGPL-3.0 licence; you're free to read, modify, and self-host it under those terms.
Privacy, changes & governing law
Your privacy is covered by our Privacy Policy. These terms may change; because they're version-controlled with the open-source code, every revision is public and dated. Continued use after a change means you accept it. These terms are governed by the laws of the Province of Ontario and the federal laws of Canada that apply there.